Naomi Osaka of Japan caused a major upset by taking out Angelique Kerber in straight sets (6-3 6-1). Although seeded 6th in this event, Kerber entered the event as the defending champion – to face the young Osaka in their first meeting. The event is also missing the Men’s defending champion.
Osaka has shown a lot of potential in her career thus far; while her 19 year old body has been prone to injuries, not allowing her to commit to compete lengthily throughout the Tour…when she is in decent shape, these are the kind of results she has been marked to be able to produce. This is her first Top 10 win; and what a time for it on this grand stage! She has had not-so-favourable results recently in Cincy and Toronto, and was rather low on confidence coming into the US Open.
Post-Match:
“I felt really relieved, especially since I was so nervous on the last point. I just barely returned the serve. I just really didn’t want to play a long point on the last one, so I was really glad when she made an error.
I tend to be really negative on myself, to the point where I don’t really know what I’m doing anymore. Since Toronto, I would say, I’ve been being really solid about that.” – Osaka
This season’s US Open will be more about the resurgence of stars like Maria Sharapova and some names missing from the draws due to injuries like Belinda Bencic who had surgery performed on her left wrist, Novak Djokovic (elbow), Stanislas Wawrinka surgery performed on left knee), Kei Nishikori (torn tendon right wrist), Milos Raonic (persistent wrist injury), Samantha Stosur, to name a few. Marin Čilić and Gael Monfils had question marks around their fitness in time for the tournament, but they both made the draw as the 5th and 18th seeds respectively.
The 2014 US Open champion and this season’s Wimbledon Finalist will play a R2 match versus an unseeded Florian Mayer. A few other players had doubts around their availability and fitness, including the likes of Nick Kyrgios and Andy Murray. Murray withdrew citing a hip injury, while the Aussie made the draw.
